


By Invitation Only

by Nagaem_C



Series: The Sewing Box: Needles and Pins One-Shots [8]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, Divorce, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Nightmares, POV Alternating, Post-Reichenbach, Pre-Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-26
Updated: 2014-11-26
Packaged: 2018-02-26 18:47:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2662541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nagaem_C/pseuds/Nagaem_C
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock Holmes is dead, and he's left a mess behind. His best friend and his Detective Inspector are each finding that their lives are coming apart at the seams; they can't help but be drawn together in the vacuum of his absence.</p><p>John and Greg build a friendship in the wake of the Fall...and through an accidental ritual, they support each other in turns as they begin to find their balance.</p><p> <b>(Takes place beginning nine days after Reichenbach, three years before Stitching Up the Tears; may stand alone)</b></p><p>POV alternates evenly between Greg and John.</p>
            </blockquote>





	By Invitation Only

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ButterscotchCandybatch](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ButterscotchCandybatch/gifts).



  
**By Invitation Only**

 

**1.**  
_24 June 2011_

.

 

The phone on Greg's desk was ringing, the long single ring of a transferred call from an outside line. It was better than the double ring of inter-office, to be sure: he didn't have any good answers for his higher-ups, nor for the seemingly hundreds of nosy parkers in the building who insisted on asking him the most _inane_ bloody questions.

_(Did you see it coming?)_  
_No, I didn't._

_(Was he depressed?)_  
_Not as far as I could tell._

_(You must have seen the signs.)_  
_Six years, and I never saw. Maybe I was completely thick, after all._

_(Well, he never was quite right, was he?)_  
_Excuse me, my knuckles seem to have a prior engagement with your face..._

The phone was still ringing. Greg snatched up the handset and answered curtly, gritting his teeth over the pounding of his headache. "Lestrade."

"Inspector—I'm so thankful I've reached you. This is Martha Hudson, at 221 Baker Street—"

"Yes," he interrupted her flighty introduction, "I remember you, Mrs Hudson, of course I do. What can I help you with?"

It was clear that she needed something. He was immediately certain she must be terribly upset, to think for even one second that Greg wouldn't remember her. They'd been on a first name basis since the previous Christmas, for all that they'd only seen each other on four or five occasions in that time. He'd eaten her _biscuits,_ for God's sake.

"Ooh, I'm so sorry dear, I _hate_ to bother you when you're working, it's just..."

"Yes?"

"It's John. I simply don't know what else to _do,_ he's not taken any food and I'm certain he's not sleeping—I'm at the end of my rope! Could you, maybe, come and talk to him?"

"I, well,"—Greg swallowed down the instinctive protests of _why should he talk to me_ and _we're not terribly close_ and _what help would I be,_ and found himself nodding, despite it all—"yes, of course. I'll be there soon as I can."

 

.

 

When Greg arrived at Baker Street, he hesitated before the door. It had been only ten days since he'd last been here, but it may as well have been a lifetime; the memory of that night seemed unreal, almost as if it had happened to someone else completely. Of course he vividly recalled the frustrated sense of losing his grasp on the situation, and the hot shame he'd had to hide as those handcuffs had ratcheted closed. He remembered the Chief Superintendent's bloody nose, the shock that had rung in his ears louder than the shouting as he'd watched the two men run into the darkness...and then, after a night-long manhunt during which he'd personally made only vague participatory motions, the mid-morning news that had made his blood run cold. In the days since, he'd sifted through each of those memories time and time again, with restless hands and a guilty heart.

 _Get on with it,_ he admonished himself, spurring his reluctant feet forward on the pavement. _It may be useless, but you'll do what you've been asked._

Mrs Hudson opened the door to his knock, wringing her hands and looking up at him with pleading, watery eyes. "Gregory. _Thank_ you for coming. He's shut himself in the bath, but he hasn't had water running. The door from the hall is locked of course, but maybe he doesn't remember that there's no working lock anymore on the door that comes from Sherlock's—" She cut herself off abruptly at the mention of the name, pressing the side of her hand to her mouth.

"All right. Go and sit down, Mrs Hudson. Have yourself a cup of tea, yeh? You've done your best, just relax awhile."

Greg mounted the stairs grimly, as if approaching a grisly murder scene. In his mind, it wasn't all that far off, really. The door to the sitting room stood closed, a small mercy: he turned aside and took the door that led into the kitchen, instead, setting the bag of takeaway on the cluttered table with as little attention to his surroundings as he could manage. He'd already turned to move down the hallway when he stopped, realising what he'd done; deliberately, he made himself turn around and face the room he'd left.

 _Microscope, beakers, books. All still there. Beer bottles on the worktop, no dishes or mugs out anywhere—she's taken away whatever she's brought that he hasn't eaten, and he's not been drinking tea either, because if anyone were doing dishes they would've cleared the bottles away._ Framing the sight of the kitchen in light of working out John's activities, it wasn't as painful as he'd expected. He didn't linger on the mess of the table, though, nor did he raise his eyes to look through to the main room before moving away.

"John," he called softly, his mouth close to the bathroom door. "Are you there?"

He allowed silence for five seconds, then knocked and spoke a bit louder. "John. John, it's Greg Lestrade. Answer me, please."

A faint murmur reached his ear. It sounded vaguely like "Piss off."

"Love to, but your landlady asked me to have a chat with you." He tried the knob. Locked, as Mrs Hudson had suggested.

Greg's lips thinned as he turned and pushed through the door on his right. He didn't bother to force himself to look closely at this room—he'd only ever seen it twice, anyway, but it was a dead man's bedroom, and that was reason enough to move through it with sombre focus. The latch on the glass-panelled door disengaged quietly, and he took a deep breath as he pushed it open.

John sat on the floor in the centre of the room, facing away. Greg carefully stepped around him, gingerly taking a seat on the edge of the tub; _he's a wreck_ was his first thought at the sight of the man he faced.

John's cheeks were sallow, his hair unkempt; he was dressed in a rumpled T-shirt and pyjama bottoms that looked to be on their second or third day's wearing. His stare was focused on a box, open on the tile floor between his bare feet: a medical kit, from what Greg could see, probably pulled from the open cabinet beneath the sink. He was holding something between his hands, worrying it back and forth in small motions.

Greg spoke quietly. "John."

When the man's gaze turned upward to Greg at last, his breath caught. Something about John's eyes seemed wrong, as if he'd been drained and left hollow—as if some essential life force had been twisted and pulled to the breaking point.

John said nothing, simply stared up at him unblinking.

"I've brought curries over for us. Thought you might be up for some lunch. Have you eaten?"

A flicker of something—confusion?—passed over John's face, but he made no response. The convulsive movements of his hands began once more, and Greg's eyes were drawn to the item within them.

It was a scalpel.

_Fucking hell._

"Hey," he said, not sure whether to be gentle or stern, and ending up with something oddly in between. "You should really eat something. Come on. How long have you been in here, huh? Let's go sit somewhere more comfortable, okay?" He held out a hand as he stood.

John shifted his blank stare from Greg's earnest attempt at a comforting expression, sliding clouded eyes downward over Greg's hand and then to his own. He licked his lips, slowly, then loosened his grip; the scalpel fell to the floor with a metallic clatter.

Greg could see the little plastic cover on the blade, now, and breathed a sigh of relief. Even as he did, though, his mind was vibrating with the possible implications, and jumping ahead of itself to put further pieces together, ones he hadn't closely considered since the serial case that had brought John Watson into his acquaintance.

 _First thing I do, after I get him settled,_ he thought, reaching forward to clasp John's forearm and pull him up to stand, _I'm taking the blades out of that kit, and then I'm searching his room. There's a bloody gun here somewhere, and I'll be damned if I'll let_ both _of them off themselves!_

 

.

 

  
**2.**  
_10 July 2011_

.

 

A brisk little knock roused John, just before the sitting room door opened to Mrs Hudson's voice. "Oo-hoo! Dear?"

John lifted his head from the little pillow, feeling the stretching sensation that meant the stitching had probably left pressure marks. He hadn't moved in awhile, apparently. "Yeah," he croaked. "What is it?" He hadn't spoken in awhile, either—not since Greg had gone, the previous afternoon.

"Gregory's here, with lunch. I thought I'd make sure you were awake,"—she didn't say _decent,_ but it was implied in her voice—"before I sent him up..."

"Sure. 'S fine. He can come up." He didn't move to roll over and face the room, just yet. His eyes had gone all wet again, at the thought of having the sofa all to himself; he stared at the back cushion and blinked hard, trying to get it under control before she saw.

"Actually, dearie, I was thinking I could give him a key, I've got that spare copy—I _won't,_ of course, if it's a problem for you—it's just, what if I'm out and he comes 'round; I wouldn't expect—"

"Yes." John's voice was rough. He swallowed and tried again. "Go ahead."

"All right, then. I'll send him up in just a minute."

She tottered off down the stairs again, and John could hear her voice below, muffled and broken periodically with the lower murmur of the DI's voice.

It had been just over two weeks since the first day Greg had come over; granted, for at least the first six days of that, John hadn't been in any state to watch a calendar. He'd been exhausted, overwhelmed by nightmares that were still preventing him any good rest at all. He knew what to expect, now, and he'd adjusted to the predictable jolts of fear a bit, but it had taken time.

It had so far been the same horrible dream, always: Sherlock falling, in endless subtle variations, every single time he'd closed his eyes. Sherlock's blue eyes draining to grey in the centre of a spreading pool of red. His coat spread like broken wings around him. The sickening thud—John knew he couldn't have heard it from where he'd been running across the street. Somehow he could always, always hear it in the dream. And then, there was nothing but the ringing silence, a hum in his ears.

That awful silence of not-Sherlock—the silence that meant no heartbeat, no breath, no voice—had frequently followed John into the world after those dreams, and sometimes in that first few weeks he'd felt as if he couldn't hear anything over it for hours. Mrs Hudson would come up and set food or drink before him: she would wring her hands and gesture, and her lips would move, but all John heard was the bloody _silence_ —that awful quiet he couldn't seem to talk over, sticking in his throat like a living thing. When Greg had found him there on the bathroom floor that day, John had looked up at moving lips, and wondered what the man could possibly be trying to tell him. What could be so important? Why fight the silence, when nothing mattered anyway?

Sighing, John turned over and threw out an arm to sit up. It felt like a monumental effort. When he pushed himself upright at last, he found that Greg had already begun to quietly make himself at home in the sitting room, pulling one of the wooden side chairs up to the coffee table and spreading out various Chinese takeaway containers.

"Nice Union Jack," Greg commented, twitching his lips at the sight of John's face. "Get some rest finally?"

He rubbed at the ridges on his cheek. "Not really," he grunted, reaching out to investigate one of the nearest boxes, and finding orange chicken inside. He pointedly ignored the expression that flitted over Greg's face as he picked up chopsticks: it was what it was, he supposed, but it nevertheless seemed shameful to John to acknowledge that anyone should be proud of him for _eating._

 _No-one should be proud of me for anything, really,_ he told himself bitterly.

 

.

 

They'd eaten their meal mostly in silence, but as John's appetite wound down he realised what had been nagging at him.

"Didn't think you were coming up, today," he commented, feeling around behind himself for the worn chenille throw he'd left jammed between the sofa cushions. "Didn't you say you were back to the office?"

"Yeah, about that..." Greg's neutral expression seemed to crumble, and he sat forward to rest his elbows heavily on his knees. "You know how they told me to take two weeks' leave while they sorted things out? Well, when I finally went back in this morning, I got called up before the Chief Superintendent—his face is looking better, by the way—and wouldn't you know it. I'm on full suspension, as of today, pending an independent review of all Sher—all his cases."

"They waited two weeks to decide, and then sent you off home again, just like that?"

"Just like _that._ Donovan and Anderson, too, though I wouldn't be surprised if _they_ come through clean, in the end. Me, on the other hand..." He shrugged crookedly, running a hand roughly through his greying hair. "I'm the only one left to blame, clearly. I've known all along, _years_ now, that his involvement wouldn't fly—Christ, from the first time I _talked_ to him near a scene, I was risking my bloody job! It's a wonder, truly, that it all lasted long enough for this to—" Greg's words choked off, and he stood abruptly, turning away to hide his face in the window.

John grimaced; the orange chicken seemed to do a backflip in his stomach. "Greg, I don't know what to say. I know your job means a lot to you. But those cases—all the ones I was there for, they were clean enough, weren't they? I mean..."

"Clean, in the sense that I hounded him after every one to pull together the bare minimum of paperwork." A wet chuckle escaped the older man, and he bowed his head against the glass. "But you don't see the inner workings, John. I started in law enforcement twenty-five years ago; I worked my way up and out of the rank and file, put in the hours, pulled through years of training to get to where I could finally _do_ something. Do some real good, get some _justice_ for the people hard done by in this city. Thing is, it's all about the bureaucracy, innit? The burden of proof is a slippery slope, greased with prejudice and favouritism. _You_ saw the sort of person that ends up with the power to decide who has a say...and you punched his lights out! Imagine, for a moment, being given the opportunity to get to the _real_ killers, the rapists, the psychopaths snatching children off the street! And all I had to do was learn to bend those rules..."

"I don't have to imagine it. I remember."

In the tense silence that stretched between them, John almost thought he could hear the dismissive scoff of a ghost. He bit his lip and blinked at the skull on the mantel.

Greg drew a great inhale and turned from the window, pulling hands from his pockets and bending to clear away the lunch things: busy-work. "So," he said brusquely, "been out lately? Weather's nice. I've been thinking I should start running again, now that my schedule seems to have been freed up."

"Well, I'm getting tired of the scenery here. I might count that as improvement, but I can't imagine going out just yet. Not today, anyway," John sighed.

"Well, maybe tomorrow. Or the next day, yeh?"

"Maybe so."

"Tell you what, next time how about I invite you out? Cozy evening down the pub, that sound all right?"

John raised an eyebrow. "Sure you trust me with the liquor again so soon, Greg?"

About a week before, the DI had brought along a three-quarters-full bottle of ten-year Macallan scotch from his own flat, more than half of which had gone into John as they'd both let their words flow freely. The aftermath of _that_ misadventure had been a terrifically intense nightmare, and Greg having to clean vomit up from the sitting room rug while John had huddled miserably in his armchair.

Greg tilted his head to concede the point. "That's the benefit to being _out._ If we know we have to get home, neither of us can rationalise getting completely sloshed as a convenience, right?"

The logic was hard to refute. John shrugged and nodded, and Greg returned a fragile, lopsided smile.

 

.

 

  
**3.**  
_16 November 2011_

.

 

Greg picked up his mobile on the second ring, pinning it between his ear and shoulder as he resumed rummaging through the box atop his file cabinet. "John, hey."

"How's it going? Back in the swing of things yet?"

"Hardly," he sighed. "They moved our whole _department_ to a different floor while I was gone, can you believe that? I should consider myself lucky they deigned to give me an office at all—but apparently, while they were still undecided on my fate, this room was just being used as a catch-all. I've been digging out for two days straight; they haven't given me a single case, yet."

"It'll come, I'm sure. They'll be glad they reinstated you." 

"Thanks for the vote of confidence. I need it."

"Look, Greg—"

His brow furrowed at the small catch in John's voice, and he straightened, taking the phone in hand again. "What is it?"

"When you're done for the day, can we meet? I think—I'm inviting you out."

 

.

 

When Greg made it to their regular pub, he found John already ensconced in the booth at the back corner.

"Sorry I'm late," he said, sliding into the free seat. "Another snafu in the office, rearranging teams. Looks like I'll be having Donovan, again."

"Really." John's already morose face turned distinctly sour at the mention of the sergeant. "Who decided on that?"

"Amazingly enough, _she_ lobbied for the change, apparently. I thought she'd have relished the opportunity to get out from under the likes of me—but it seems she didn't enjoy the two months she worked under Dimmock, after all."

"Alan always seemed like a stand-up bloke to me. Maybe she just feels better when she has an excuse to be malicious," he grunted, upending his pint to drain it.

"Now, now," Greg chided him, but his heart wasn't in it. He wasn't yet sure how he felt about working with Sally again, to be honest, but he wasn't about to put up any protest. He was lucky to have a team at all, after four months' suspension. At least they'd given him a new sergeant to supervise, as well—Ranjit Patel was young and a bit green, but seemed smart enough.

 _And he wasn't up in CID while Sherlock was around, either,_ he pointed out to himself. _Hopefully that'll count for something._

He took a long swig of his own lager—it wouldn't do to leave John too far ahead, after all—and smacked his lips in appreciation. "So. Gonna tell me why we're here? 'Cuz I know it's not to chat about Scotland Yard."

John frowned. "Not with an empty glass I'm not. Just a sec." He was up and out of the booth like a shot, and when he came back a few minutes later, he seemed determined to get whatever it was off his chest. "Right. So I had a visitor, today."

"Oh, yeah?"

"Molly Hooper came by, out of the blue. She barely said a word to me at the funeral, what I can remember of it anyway, and she hadn't contacted me since. Five months, and then suddenly she shows up at Baker Street with coffees and cinnamon buns, like it's just a regular thing..."

"I haven't seen all that much of her in the last few months, either," mused Greg; "we used to meet up for lunch now and again. She kind of dropped off the map, after—well, y'know, I figured that was on me, too. I didn't have my job anymore, what were we gonna talk about?"

"I sort of asked her the same thing. Asked her what she was after, coming 'round for an afternoon chat. I've got nothing to _talk_ to her about! I'm not working, I'm barely getting by on my savings and the grace of Mrs Hudson, I _still_ don't leave the flat most days—I kind of shouted at her, I'm ashamed to say."

"Aw, John. You should give the poor girl a chance. Times have been rough, but you know, she still cares."

John's face twisted painfully. "That's not true and you know it! She wasn't friendly because she liked _me;_ it was all about staying close to _him._ She was always head over bloody heels for Sherlock—"

The name, so infrequently invoked of late, slipped from John's lips and dropped to the table between them like a solid presence; the blood drained from his face as the rest of his sentence came to a screeching halt.

They drank in dark, brooding silence after that, for a long while.

 

.

 

  
**4.**  
_4 February 2012_

.

 

**Are you busy tonight? -GL**

**Nothing happening here. Basically as normal. Why? -JW**

**I'm inviting you out. Old Duke, 20:00. -GL**

 

.

 

John brought two pints over to where Greg was seated, only to find that he'd already set two double measures of scotch out on the table. "That bad, huh?" he asked, quirking an eyebrow up. Greg didn't often start with the heavy stuff, not anymore, and if John remembered correctly, he'd already had his two off days for the week. It wasn't a good sign, when the DI was trying hard to get drunk on a work night.

"I saw her mum, today," Greg began without preamble, taking a large gulp from his drink and baring his teeth as the liquor burned its way down.

"Oh?"

"I dunno why I went into that shop anyway—well, I _do,_ I was off shift and I wanted a smoke so bad I couldn't stand it. So I ducked into the nearest grocery, instead. Thought I'd buy an apple, maybe carrots to take home; something crunchy, yeh?"

"That's good, yes. Glad to hear you're taking my advice and working on that." Once John had realised he was actually beginning to care about the world at large again, he'd begun to harp on Greg for falling back into his smoking habit. It probably wasn't altogether altruistic—smelling the cigarettes on Greg's clothing always reminded John far too much of Sherlock.

"Well, anyway. There was Priscilla Kandless, right there in the produce aisle, and _damned_ if she didn't see me before I could get away."

John claimed the second tumbler of scotch and sipped at it gingerly, less for the drink itself than to make sure Greg didn't move straight on into it. "Did she tear into you, then?"

"No!...Not really, not like she used to. She wasn't _nice,_ 'course not, I don't think that hag has a nice bone in her body. But she caught me and started asking questions, acting like she was interested in how my job was going, asking how I was coping with the legal proceedings. Wanted my _opinion_ on whether the house was gonna pull market price—the house Tracy kicked me out of over a year and a half ago—as if I even cared!" Greg shook his head vaguely, smoothing fingers over his hair with an expression of disbelief. "She treated me more like a _person_ this afternoon than I think she'd done in a decade. An' that was the strangest thing."

"Sounds like it," John hummed neutrally.

"So, I tried to cut her off, yeh? She has this way of hooking you into a conversation, it's diabolical—maybe it's respect for my elders I can't shake, maybe it's just that I spent so many years tryin' to curry favour with her in particular—but I just couldn't get away. And the longer she talked to me, the better she seemed to treat me, the harder it was to hold it together."

"How so?"

"Well, I just wanted to scream, you know? Wanted to grab her by the goddamn shoulders, shout right in her pinched little face that she can't control me anymore. Can't control Tracy through me, or me through Trace—can't lord it over me that she knows better, that she'd _warned_ her daughter not to take up with the likes of me—I'm fucking done! Done with all of it. Just wading through the bloody paperwork, at this point: waiting for the hearings to be scheduled so I can get it all over with. They'll drag it out, of course, that's how it always goes—they're telling me it might be as much as six months yet—but it may as well be a done deal. What little dignity I ever had is on its way out, now, signed away on cheques to my solicitor. So she won, right?"

John opened his mouth to respond, but couldn't think of a thing to say. Instead, he took a drink, and Greg followed suit. The pause lasted only a second or two before a fresh wave of anger visibly overtook his friend.

"An' how _dare_ Priscilla treat me like a human, _now_ —after all of this shite; after the girl she raised put me through hell, and after _she'd_ done everything in her power to push Tracy into it, I know—how _dare_ she? I wanted to put a fist through her bloody face!" Greg swallowed and hung his head, breathing heavily as he realised what he'd hissed across the table. "But I'm not a violent man. I'm not, not that way, I swear!" With that, he looked up to John with a sort of desperation—as if pleading to be confirmed, set right and made real.

"I know it. It's all right, Greg."

 

.

 

  
**5.**  
_10 August 2012_

.

 

**Got a minute? -JW**

**Finally, YES. Wrapped up the trafficking case this morning. I feel like I could sleep for days. -GL**

**Well, maybe you could put that off a little longer? I'm inviting you out. -JW**

 

.

 

It had been a long year, and Greg only vaguely remembered what John looked like without the deep bruises of fatigue that sat beneath his eyes. He was fairly certain, however, that the way John looked right now was worse than he had been in quite some time. A spike of worry turned his stomach as he slid into the booth across from the younger man, pushing across the first pint of the evening.

"Cheers," intoned John dully, and he drank deep.

"Right, mate," replied Greg, with only a cursory swig of his own lager, "you're looking like hell. You might've asked earlier, you know?"

"You had that case going. You were plenty busy, without dealing with my whiny arse on top of everything."

"Sure, human trafficking rings don't come along a dime a dozen. Hell, I'd still be beating my head against it right now, if Patel hadn't found that strange data packet! Don't know _how_ he missed it when he went through the shipping company's records the first time—but at any rate, it held exactly the missing pieces we needed. Still, John, I could've handled a _phone call._ C'mon!"

John turned weary eyes up to him, and leaned forward to rest his chin on his hands. "I thought I was dealing with it. Fuck's sake, Greg, it's not like it's a new thing, is it?"

"Hm. No, 'spose not. But your troubles,"—Greg knew better than to say the word _nightmares_ in public, John got twitchy about that—"they weren't doing you in like _this,_ the last few months. Think you can stand to tell me at all?"

John's hands came up to rub hard circles into his eyes and forehead, and his lips went thin and bloodless, but eventually he nodded. "Most of the past year, it's been the same, almost every night—different, in small ways, but always basically the same thing. A little over a week ago it changed completely, all at once, like a bloody switch flipped somewhere..." Picking up his beer again, John drank, and then stared sightlessly into the golden liquid as he began to give a halting and quiet description. "It's _that_ day. That hasn't changed. Ever. But now...now I'm on the roof. Behind him."

"Behind..." Greg breathed, half question and half encouragement. He wasn't sure if engaging directly with whatever John was about to say would be the wrong thing to do. _Hell, when in the past year, in all of this mess of ours, have I ever known the right thing to do?_

"He's up ahead, standing at the edge," John continued, closing his eyes and giving no sign that he'd heard Greg. "I can see his scarf flapping over his shoulder, every one of those bloody curls tossing in the wind, the _detail,_ god..."

Greg found that his own eyes were falling closed, as well, and prickling a bit.

"So I start walking closer, and I call out—if he hears, he doesn't show it; he just puts his phone to his ear and—and then I hear every word of that _fucking phone call_ again!"

A strangled noise came from across the table, and his eyes popped open to see John's squeezed tightly shut.

"Before I can even get close enough to see his face, he's already saying goodbye, tossing the phone. I try, every damned _night,_ but I can't even manage to say anything before he tips forward..."

Greg could see that his friend was on the very edge of the tenuous control he held so dear. Standing, he clapped a hand briefly to John's shoulder before moving to get them another pair of pints, giving the man a minute or two of privacy to pull himself back together.

When he returned, John had moved to slump sideways across the upholstered bench seat, resting his head against the dark wood-panelled wall. "You know what makes me the most pathetic, right now?" he asked, reaching to accept the offered drink and take a long pull from it.

"I don't think you _are,_ but I suppose you're gonna tell me."

"I had actually been thinking about starting to _work_ again! I even had a meeting with Sarah Sawyer at the Marylebone surgery, two weeks ago, talking over the possible arrangements. She was wary of it—and why wouldn't she be?" John scoffed into his rapidly emptying glass. "The first time I worked for her, I was continually haring off at a moment's notice to chase after _him,_ and when I wasn't, I was thinking about cases more than patients."

"Well." Greg tipped his head to one side and studied the man: the backbone of patience and competent skill that he'd been lucky enough to see a few times was still there, he was sure, under the obvious fog of exhaustion. "It was all still new, back then, wasn't it? Surely if he hadn't—in time, things may've evened out. Stabilised, a bit."

"Maybe. We'll never know. Now Sarah's not concerned about _him,_ she's just concerned about my health. Wondering if I'm taking medication to sleep, or if I'm still drinking myself into a stupor to do it. Worried I'll be a danger to my patients, or myself."

"Did she say all that?"

"She didn't have to. Body language, little verbal cues. It was all right there, laid out in front of me as clear as if—as if _he_ were talking in my ear, pointing out the details." John sighed, then, a deep and cavernous exhale that seemed to leave him diminished. "He's just never, ever going to go, is he?"

Greg bit his lip and answered honestly. "I don't know, John."

"I keep thinking I want him to." He met Greg's eyes solemnly. "But then, I'm afraid he will."

 

.

 

  
**6.**  
_1 September 2012_

.

 

"Just got out of the last hearing. It's done." Greg's voice sounded strained over the phone speaker.

"You all right, then?"

There was a long silence, filled only by the inconsistent background noise of an outdoor crowd: John assumed he was hearing the soundscape of the courthouse steps. Finally, Greg answered, "Fuck, no, I'm not all right. I'm inviting you out."

 

.

 

John walked into The Old Duke expecting to find Greg hunched over a strong drink; when he slid into their booth, however, he found the man with a large glass of red wine, calmly twisting its stem between his fingers.

"I've never seen you drinking wine before," he commented.

"Gotta be in the right mood for it, I guess. I felt like reminiscing, tonight." Greg took a slow sip and tilted his head back, narrowing his eyes briefly in the direction of the ceiling. "It's how we met, after all."

"You and Tracy met through wine?"

"Sort of, yeah. I had a mate from uni—Sean—who found his calling in the culinary arts. Worked at a bunch of different restaurants, over the years, and in early ninety-three he made sous chef at _Le Cœur Jaloux._ It was a good step up for him, and he and I were still fairly close then; so, when he used his guest invite on me, for their annual after-hours reception...well, wine and nibbles wasn't my scene. Hardly anything _was_ my scene, at the time; I was an overworked traffic constable with no social life to speak of."

John smirked and put in, "The more things change, the more they stay the same."

"Hey now. I go out with _you_ nearly every week."

"And cheers to that, Greg, but if you're calling nights with _me_ a social life..."

"Point." Greg held out his glass to click with John's in a silent toast. "Anyway. I showed up to that fancy do in the only half-decent suit I owned, and hung off to the side, holding up the wall..."

"A solid strategy. You were clearly in your element," John quipped.

"Call me a late bloomer," he returned easily, unaffected by the teasing. "As it turned out, I wasn't the only one there who didn't really belong. Tracy spotted me, figured I'd make a good outlet for her personal rebellion: her Mum had dragged her along, so she got her revenge by coming over and chatting me up."

"And from then on, it was history?"

"Yes and no. We hit it off; she didn't want anything serious. She insisted that we not be exclusive, but whenever Mum was nearby Trace would hang all over me like a lovesick puppy, just to hack her off. She brought me to her family parties; I took her to my brother's wedding...she got what she wanted, and I got everything I could handle."

"Sounds like a bit of a damaged scenario," murmured John.

He chuckled softly and shrugged. "I was a bit of a damaged bloke, at the time," was his enigmatic answer. "But a couple years later, after she and I had a screaming row over her finding out I _hadn't_ actually been seeing anyone else...that's when we really became a couple. I waited another two years before I proposed."

John was surprised at how detached his friend seemed, gazing serenely downward through all of this as if he were reading out a story that had been printed on the table. These pub nights of theirs were often like emotional roulette, but whatever the situation, whichever of them claimed the spotlight, there was inevitably a strong undercurrent of pain.

 _He's always done a good job covering it, when it comes to her,_ he realised with a twinge of sympathy. Aloud, he asked, "Did you ever see the problems coming?"

"I s'pose they were always there, really. She was a firecracker, and woe betide the unfortunate soul who crossed her, unless they were willing to fight back! I was just as stubborn, in my own way, believing I could make things work without sacrificing the important stuff. I think I had my doubts about Tracy long before the first time I was told she'd been cheating. Took me ages to admit it to myself, though."

"I've got to say, Greg—you really seem to be handling this. When we talked this afternoon, you didn't sound half as calm..."

"Oh, I'm not calm, John. Trust me on this one." The DI downed the remainder of his wine and raised his eyes at last.

The intensity of the expression in them startled a gasp from John's lips. _"Ah."_

"No, I'm not certain _what_ I am, right now...I might need some help figuring it out, actually. What do I look like I'm feeling, John? What am I _supposed_ to be feeling, do you think? Hurt? Angry? I know I've been angry, for a long time, but it never felt like this. Ashamed, perhaps? Disgusted with the memory of my own poor judgment? Sad and lonely? Or vindicated, maybe? Triumphant that I'm finally free?"

"Any...any of those things would be perfectly understandable," John answered him quietly. "Or all of them."

"Well, there's one thing I know for sure, one thing I know this _can't_ be, no matter what it feels like."

"What's that?"

"I'm not supposed to love her anymore."

 

.

 

  
**7.**  
_31 March 2013_

.

 

**Hey, Birthday Boy. Up for drinks tonight? -GL**

There was no immediate response, which Greg assumed meant that his friend was working. He set his mobile down beside him and returned to the form he'd been filling out; a few minutes later, the phone buzzed against the desk with an incoming call.

"And to think I'd been hoping that I could go a year without anyone remembering," John sighed in lieu of a greeting.

"Well, hello to you too! Sorry, John; I never forget a date. It's a fault of mine."

"Ah, but you forgot last year," he challenged good-naturedly.

"Wrong. I remembered and came by, but you were in a bad way that week, and Mrs H said you'd gone to bed early. If you'll recall, I popped in the next evening and we watched _Casino Royale_ together. I just didn't make a point of the felicitations, at the time."

"You're fucking unbelievable, you know that, Greg?"

"It's not that strange, I've just got a good memory. People are _supposed_ to remember other people's birthdays and such, right? C'mon, I haven't seen you in a week and a half, let's just go out."

"Fine, _fine._ No presents, though."

"Wouldn't dream of it," Greg assured him with a grin.

 

.

 

True to his word, Greg left the DVD he'd bought in his office—with plans to bring it over to Baker Street within the week—and went over to the pub empty-handed. John greeted him with a somewhat sheepish smile and an unusually friendly overhead wave, before he'd gotten three steps past the door.

"Greg, hey," he said, standing and gesturing into the high-walled booth, "we've got a bit of extra company."

"Why, if it isn't Molly," Greg exclaimed. "Fancy seeing you here!"

She was pink-cheeked and chipper, wearing dark leggings and a purple athletic windbreaker zipped up to her chin, and a fluffy, colourful crocheted scarf draped over that. "I happened to run into John on my way home from a class. We, um, got to talking a bit, and then he mentioned he was meeting up with you, Greg—and I realised I hadn't seen you in awhile, either. You don't mind, I hope?"

"Of course not. But, if you'll excuse me for just a moment—I need to make sure he's not paying for his own drinks..." Winking, Greg turned to follow John up to the bar. He leaned in alongside his friend and spoke quietly as they waited for the bartender's attention. "This is a surprise. I thought you didn't want help marking the date?"

John glanced over his shoulder and murmured back, "It was a chance meeting; I couldn't very well _not_ mention my plans, after we'd chatted for five minutes straight. Besides, you were right. I've been isolating myself too long."

"I'm all for it, don't get me wrong. I was just worried you might rather be private."

"You didn't say it, did you?" Now John had turned to look him in the eye.

"Say—"

"I didn't say it, either. So this isn't an _invitation._ This is just drinks. And I don't have a problem with that, tonight, do you?"

Greg felt his face relaxing into a real smile. It felt good.

 

.

 

"So on the way here, John was telling me you're a prodigy with dates, is that right?"

"What?" Greg raised his eyebrows at Molly over his pint. "I wouldn't call myself a bleeding _prodigy,_ for crying out loud."

John snorted a short laugh into his own drink. "So if we were to quiz you..."

 _"Pfft._ Fire away."

"All right..." John put on an exaggerated thinking face that only intensified the grin Greg wore. "Let's start with Molly's birthday."

"May twenty-fourth," he returned without hesitation.

"Your nephew," Molly immediately countered, smiling.

"Ian's May the sixth," he answered. "And my niece Sophie's is August nineteenth, before you ask."

It was John's turn. "Okay then, how about Sally Donovan?"

"November seventh. She'll be thirty-eight, this year."

Molly swallowed a sip of her gin and tonic, and gestured in midair as she tried to think of the name. "Ooh, that other one of yours—I never met him either, the one everyone was always making jokes about..."

Greg laughed. "You mean Phil Anderson! Hah! September twenty-second. He doesn't even know I know it." He knew that by "everyone", Molly meant "Sherlock"—but he let the thought pass him by, and if there was a reaction from John he couldn't see it.

"This is too easy," John grinned. "We've gotta come up with something harder, Molly! How about—your brother's wedding anniversary."

"May eleventh. Can't stump me! Though, really, John—how would either of you even _know_ if I were lying?"

That was enough to make both John and Molly break down into helpless laughter for a minute or two; when the hilarity calmed somewhat, Greg idly swirled the last inch or so of his second pint around, and said, "No, no, you have to ask me the ones you might know yourselves. Like, Molly—I first met you on the eighteenth of April, 2009. And John, we met on January thirtieth of the next year."

"Oh my god, Greg," squeaked Molly, blinking, "you remember that? That was my first week on the job at Barts."

"How could I forget? You were a godsend to work with, compared to what-was-his-name. Saperstein. He was _awful._ You remember the way he'd wrinkle his nose, Mol?"

The mention of the entirely disagreeable man she'd succeeded at the hospital sent Molly into another fit of stifled giggles; meanwhile, John quietly wandered off to procure another round of drinks. He wore a thoughtful expression when he returned, and as he distributed their glasses he said, "You know, I'm wondering if it works the other way for you, Greg."

"How do you mean?"

"Like, I throw out a date, and you tell us if something important happened on it."

Greg shrugged. "Go ahead, try me. I'll warn you, though, I won't be giving you a history lesson. Personal dates only."

Molly leaned in towards him, pushing a stray tendril of hair away from her face. "How about...November twenty-eighth."

"Hm, I've actually got nothing too special for that one, Mol. Gimme another?" _Of course, I could tell her the twenty-ninth was the day I proposed to Tracy...but that would be cheating, wouldn't it?_ he thought, crinkling his eyes at her in an encouraging smile.

She tapped her fingers on her glass and tried again. "Okay then, December...thirteenth?"

"Easy, that's my Mum's birthday! God rest her." Greg raised his glass in a silent toast to her memory, and drank deep.

John tilted his head and raised his glass as well, and then tried, "June second?"

This was nice, actually, this impromptu trip down memory lane. Greg hadn't felt quite this relaxed in some time. "That would be the second day of the three I spent moving into my current flat. Douglas ordered in pizza, and we ate it off two boxes of my old records, listening to Zeppelin."

"Aw, that's sweet," Molly said. "October ninth."

Greg closed his eyes as he answered with a faint smile, "That night...God, yeah. 2004. That night was the first time Sherlock turned up near one of my boss DI Harwood's scenes. Everyone thought he was high, he kept spouting off about looking at the ceilings. I was the one tasked with running the kid off..."

There was a long silence, at that. He looked up to find that John's face had lost its colour, and his lips were pressed hard together; glancing over, he saw that Molly's composure was little better.

"Gosh, I d-didn't notice the time," she stammered, gathering up her handbag; "I should really, um. I should go. All right? Happy birthday, John—it was lovely—I'll, I'll talk to you sometime soon, Greg..."

_Me and my bloody big mouth!_

Greg slid out of the booth and allowed her to scoot past him, and she did little more than pat at his arm with a shaky hand before she was off and away, her workout trainers squeaking a fast rhythm on the pub's wood floors as she went.

 

.

 

  
**8.**  
_15 June 2013_

.

 

John wasn't going to call.

He _wasn't._

He got out of the flat, that was the first priority—he took a brisk lap around Regent's Park, avoiding certain benches and certain angles of sight as had become unconscious habit.

Next, he went out of his way to get coffee in a place he'd never been before. As he drank, his newspaper open across his lap, he surreptitiously watched a pretty woman pick up her cappuccino from the barista and carry it across to a nearby armchair.

The woman was smiling down at her phone. Seating herself, she thumbed in a message to someone with her free hand, and sent it off with a soft laugh. John found his attention strangely caught by her: something about her brightly coloured dress, the way she touched fingers to the barrette holding back her ginger curls, the way she sat poised on the edge of her seat one minute and then slumped gleefully backwards in the next, carefree and unconsciously sensual.

He watched her for longer than he'd meant to, and as he did, he tried vaguely to figure out whether the subtle stirring he was feeling might be genuine interest.

_What would you say to her, if it were? Hi, my name's John Watson, I haven't slept through two nights running since 2011, and I basically live in a shrine to my dead genius best friend; can I take you out?_

Even as a joke, it sounded piteous.

No, he wasn't even considering it. The draw he felt wasn't an urge to go on the pull, no, far from it; it was an urge to _understand_ something. To see a knot of mystery within the boring mundanity of the world, and to watch its threads being teased apart piece by piece...

He could practically hear Sherlock's voice in his ear, right now, picking away at this woman's little secrets. _There: observe the healing scratches on her left ankle and calf. She's around a cat frequently, perhaps a flatmate's, but they're not on good terms,_ said the man within his mind.

John's fingers curled tightly around his coffee mug, and he blinked hard. _That_ was what he missed. That was what he wished for, every night and every day; he'd tried so long to deny it, but everything came back to it, in the end.

Everything.

And wasn't it just his luck, that he was exactly two years too late to the realisation.

He took a sip of coffee, sightlessly turned the paper to a new page, and peered across to the woman again, taking in the details that he knew Sherlock would notice.

 _There are smudges on the side of her hand, surely you can see that much,_ the phantom pointed out next, and the rich, dark memory of his voice seemed just as much a drug as it had always been. _Green and blue. She spent her morning working on a painting. Likely a landscape..._

"And just how the bloody hell could you know _that?"_ John muttered under his breath.

He must have been louder than he'd thought. The woman looked up sharply, narrowed luminous dark eyes at him, and flashed an edgy smile. "I'm sorry, did you say something?"

"No, I'm sorry, it's nothing," John told her, folding the paper and standing to leave. "I was just reminded of someone I used to know. Sorry to disturb you."

 

.

 

When John returned to the street, he saw that the sun had come out. He squinted up at the featureless, pale blue sky, and closed his eyes a moment against the familiarity before beginning to walk.

_I'm not going to call._

_This is a regular day, like any other. I can get through it._

_I can handle this. I'm not going to call!_

His phone rang, stopping him short. He pulled it from his pocket and stared at it, wetting his lips convulsively.

"Hey, Greg."

"John, hi. Not interrupting anything, am I?"

"No. Just out for a walk."

"That's nice. Good weather for it. I just thought I'd call and, um, see how you were doing..."

"Fine. I'm okay," he lied, feeling exactly as awkward as Greg sounded. In the loaded silence that followed, he watched pedestrian traffic splitting around his static figure on the pavement, like a diagram of aerodynamic flow.

"I miss him, you know?"

"Yeah," he replied. "I miss him too."

The people around him continued to flow past. He was a wing with no lift.

"I never...I mean, he saw so damned much. And I keep telling myself that if I'd ever said it, he'd have hated it. But still, it kills me—I never got the chance to tell him how much he did for me..."

"Greg..."

"...an' how much I cared, y'know—I never had a kid, but I sort of always felt—"

_"Greg."_

John expelled an explosive breath just as his friend cut off his own words, and then they both spoke at the same time:

"I'm inviting you out."

 

\-- _fin_ \--

 


End file.
